Thanks to you Hold. For all you do here, and for just being you!

Much love to you and yours, from my deepest heart

Hold,

Happy New Year to you and Ms. H. Please don't be mad at me when I say that in spite of the fact that you are so willing to bare your soul and be honest about your feelings--I still sometimes feel as though you're out of touch with most of your true feelings (except for fear). You won't believe me, but fudge it--I think you're a great guy, and I pray that someday you'll discover that for yourself. (Not holding my breath of course.)

Back to posts---I'm not so keen on the ear-licking thing either. Like Miranda, I sometimes find it just too wet. But I do enjoy a quick light bite of my ear lobe or neck. It doesn't tickle--but does stimulate.

Star:

Thanks. Best wishes to you and yours.

As usual, you are very perceptive.

These days I am completely cut off from my feelings. That is, I do not feel much joy or pleasure and although I do feel pain but I do my best to ignore it. I try to stay as numb as possible. TV and computer games help because you can pass hours mindlessly ignoring your feelings. When I was younger I felt feelings intensely. My aunt used to say that was a gift, and helped one experience life more deeply. I told her it was a curse and I wish I could turn them off. I have found a way. It is not healthy, but it is all I know.

I told her this morning that I feel empty and depressed. She said that is difficult to live with. I told her not to worry, I would pretend to be OK. She got angry and said there should be no pretending between us. I laughed and said it was far too late for that.

Hold,

It makes me sad that you feel down. As we get older our POV does change. However, we should be working towards improving our lives and not ignoring our challenges.

No easy fix, right? I tend to feel like you do at times and it is not my norm to do so. So it is an internal fight for me.

I don't have a spouse as supportive as you have. I have a bit less. He can't see that and I'm too tired to try to keep helping him in that direction. So in a sense I have given up and working to move forward myself. I've reconciled and ok with it because I know I have to be.

Still I find that caring and humor are an intricate part of my personality so I am not so dumb as to think no one on this planet cares. I know many do and some with great humor to boot.

My mission is to partner with such ones on big and little quests. To teach my son to have care in his heart along with a bit of humor. It is a big challenge for me since my son has a strong pull from H's side of the family regarding guarding his feelings in a not so safe manner. He pulls from me as well and he is working on finding his balance. A bit of a slow learner but I'm hoping he isn't as slow as his dad who is 55 and hasn't figured out life yet.

I hope you do find your place of comfort and not feel depressed. I wish I could sprinkle or give you that magic potion but I think that potion is still illegal in large quantities. So I will encourage you to seek remedies out that are both legal and viable. Maybe aroma therapy, some good tapping or other alternative medicine remedies. Some of those emotional therapies bring out deep seated emotions that causes a break through so the healing can begin. Maybe hot yoga? I don't know much about it. My therapy is working and well.....that's what I've got to do.....

Take care,
Orchid

Don't feel bad for me. I always feel down. It is permanent. I have learned to coexist with it.

Mrs H does not like when I admit I feel down. So I mostly pretend to be OK. Of course, that causes me to feel very alone. She does not like that, either.

Hold,

I was exploring why someone might be prefer to remain depressed, and came across a few really interesting articles---thought I would share:

Are You Addicted to Unhappiness?

Depressed People May Choose To Be Sad

Hold, star, I think this stuff is fascinating and am hopeful to see where it leads. Chronic depression runs in my family and we address it in different ways. Hold I find it so admirable that you have kept your depression from ruining your enjoyment and support of your kids.

Thanks for thinking of me. Sincerely, not snarky. This place is as close to friends as I have in life.

As for the articles, that is me. Addicted to unhappiness. Did you see this quote in the second article? They even mentioned me by name!

“This is important because it suggests that depressed individuals may sometimes be unsuccessful in decreasing their sadness in daily life because, in some sense, they hold on to it.”

Wow...I relate to this as well.

Ok, now what I'm about to post needs to be taken with love....ok?

I read your above post and was eating my lunch......almost lost it when I read:

'They even mentioned me by name!.........because, in some sense, they hold on to it.”



Ok, now you know HOLD that is not how we think about you....... Ok?

U r a good man and you've been there for many of us, helping us get through some difficult times.

That means we r here 4 u 2. Have to go clean up my keyboard now.....(jk).

Orchid

Oh, Hold...you're still here! How marvelous. You made my day.

I haven't caught up on all your posts yet in the years I've been gone. In the last few posts, I see you haven't lost your ability to tickle yourself with your observations.

Hence, everyone else.



LA

Did I just spot LA?

Yup there was a fly by

Maybe she'll do another drive-by and park for a spell.

Hi LA

OMG, LA was here! Yay!

I am soooo mature!

Does that mean just plain old, Hold?



Hi, Chrysalis, Ace and Miranda!

So good to see you LA!

Good to see you, too, SW. It's really wonderful to find so many posters still here.

OMG, LA. I have missed you SO much. You are the single most influential person I've ever known, aside from my mom. I so hope you will continue to provide guidance, as much as I hope your own life is going well.

{{{{Cat!}}}}

So good to see you here. I feel like I've hijacked Hold's thread, though.

So, Hold--I wanted to ask you how you feel about your wife's financial infidelity?

It is not infidelity if I know about it. She isn't charging things that we didn't discuss or that I did not approve. She simply wants more than I can afford and isn't interested in cutting back to facilitate paying down debt. And to be fair, I am not working hard to validate her desires and dreams. I make her feel invalidated out of my own insecurity that I cannot afford to fund the lifestyle she desires. I haven't found a way to share the wonder of her dreaming without feeling stressed and inadequate.

We are simply a bad match but both too fearful and too risk averse and too stubborn to admit that we both would have had more satisfying lives if we had never married or had divorced decades ago. I am done trying to fix it or make it better. I will try to have a pleasant companionate marriage. I am unwilling to aim higher. I have been on this path for almost 12 years. I am not changing now.

We got our kids through high school and into college. God willing S22 graduates this spring and he has a good job offer so he will be self-sufficient. In 2 or 3 years (she may get a 5 years masters degree) God willing D19 will also be employed and self-supporting. At that point I will have accomplished all of my life goals. There is nothing I find animating or exciting or motivating. I will just keep putting one foot in front of the other until I can't anymore.

No need to pity or encourage or discourage me. I am making these choices with intention and eyes wide open. Mrs. H makes her daily decision to stay with me the same way. I lied in the previous paragraph. I do have one life goal remaining. To get Mrs. H to stay married to me. That is a daily challenge and gives my life meaning. The internal tension between desperately wanting it and hating myself for wanting it creates exquisite torture inside myself. Exactly what a depressed masochistic person needs to make life worth living!

I have no pity for you, Hold. You're a truly marvelous human to know. I do attempt to encourage or discourage you. You got me there. So if you don't want me on your thread, just say the word. I still fear doing harm. I can be risk-averse as well.

Where my question came from--I read where she took your charge card while you slept. Where you had an agreement on the way to pay for something and she then changed it and charged without your knowledge...and then told you afterwards. I don't see any difference than having an affair and telling you about it afterwards, again and again. Because it's not merely financial--it hits honesty, respect and trust. But you might be inured to it by now?

I don't understand the non-pooled money, though. It has always seemed to me that one operating account for the marriage was the symbol of both being all in, in a marriage. Not your money, not her money, but the marital money.

We're moved and retired--but our old neighbors didn't do that. They had separate accounts throughout their marriage and it ended in divorce over money. Because it breaks trust and separates decisions that affect both partners. So I need your help figuring out how the separate account thing helps the marriage.

Also--what video games do you play? We've been playing Hearthstone.

LA

Her taking my card without permission and my having to sleep with them on my person to prevent that happened years and years ago during the second bout of overspending. She doesn't lie and steal anymore. She just pushes and pushes for things and eventually I tire of saying no and we agree to spend money on something she wants (sometimes for herself, often for the kids). I didn't mention it as a recent occurrence. I mentioned it to someone as an anecdote showing that I know how disorienting it is when you can't trust your spouse. At all. Not even not to harm you while you are sleeping. I said it not to complain on my own behalf but as a way of trying to build a connection to someone hurting so badly that they might believe that no one else can understand their pain.

The non-pooled money also happened years and years ago, even earlier, after the first bout of overspending. We started our marriage with joint accounts. I told her she could run the money until the day that I put my card into the ATM and no cash came out. Never thought that day would arrive. It did. As you know, she spent all our joint savings (100% contributed by me as pre-marriage she had no savings besides 401k plan - huge red flag I ignored) and ran up credit card debts. Since then we have had separate checking accounts. Having separate accounts helps our marriage because otherwise she would spend all our joint money and run up more debts.

I agree in some sense it prevents our marriage from being a safe place that is emotionally fulfilling for me. And it hurts our marriage because we are opponents over money instead of being partners. But as you know I have given up on finding the marriage satisfying and I have no hope that we will ever be financial partners. Like I said, my only goal is to stay married. The health of the marriage is irrelevant. Well, so long as the illness is chronic and not acute. So I don't do anything to fix the high cholesterol or high blood pressure in our marriage. I just take pills to mask the symptoms and carry on.

As for games, when I have a console available I play first person shooters - mostly Battlefield. I am terrible but I like pretending I have agency. When I only have a PC available I play turn based strategy games. They don't make many these days but there are lots of oldies but goodies available to pass the time. Thanks for asking.

Spending can also be an addiction. My MIL has it along with a few of her children. I believe WST has that problem as well. He keeps trying to spend the same $$$ over and over. Reality says you can't do that but he keeps trying. Least that's how I see it and I was his $$$$ backup for most of our M.